Revisiting the 2001 draft

Mark Teixeira doubled Friday, hours after announcing
that he would retire after this season,

Mark Teixeira said Friday that this will be his last season. Inasmuch as he's 36, in the last year of his contract and was hitting .198/.287/.340 when he made this announcement, he's basically saying to the game, you can't fire me, I quit.

Which is not to denigrate his career. Man hit 404 homers, led the league in different years in homers, runs, RBIs, and total bases, won five Gold Gloves ... yeah, he could play a bit. He's got a Hall of Fame case, but I won't argue for him while Jeff Bagwell is still on the outside.

He was the fifth overall pick in 2001's draft, which was, of course, the year Joe Mauer went No. 1 overall. (Teixeira was taken out of college, which is why he's three years older than Mauer.) Teixeira's pending retirement will leave Mauer and Gavin Floyd as first round picks still playing from that draft. Floyd, now with the Blue Jays, is on the 60-day disabled list after suffering a torn lat, which just adds to a long list of injuries for the veteran in recent years.

But really, the list of 2001 first rounders is kinda daunting. Mauer and Teixeira were stars. Floyd had a good run in the White Sox rotation. Mark Prior had one big year. Casey Kotchman, Chris Burke, Jeremy Bonderman, Jason Bulger, Aaron Heilmann, Greg Gross, Mike Fontenot, Bobby Crosby -- they put in a few years as rotation pieces, marginal regulars, bullpen arms. And the rest, more than half the first round, didn't do much of anything. Dewon Brazelton? Josh Karp? Macay McBride?

Go a bit deeper into the draft and you find a few familar names scattred among the never-weres: David Wright (supplemental first round). J.J. Hardy (second round). And, in the fourth round, Ricky Nolasco.

Yes, Nolasco came out of the same draft class as Mauer and Teixeira. He's going to outlast Teixeira. And almost everybody else in that draft, for that matter.

When there's no clear Plan B

Bruce Rondon may be Plan A
for the back end of the Detroit
bullpen, but his spring training
has not gone well so far.

More than three weeks remain before the regular season opens, but a couple of high-expectation teams have developed significant roster questions that don't have easy answers. It will be interesting to see how they cope.

Detroit Tigers: Jose Valverde, who had been their closer the past few years, is out of the picture (and still unemployed, for that matter). Bruce Rondon, a hard-throwing 22-year-old prospect, had been deemed the front-runner as Valverde's successor, although manager Jim Leyland was coy during the offseason about the bullpen glory job.

Rondon has struggled with command this spring. The Tigers skipped his most recent scheduled appearance to work on his mechanics in a side session and pronounced themselves pleased with the tweaks, but we've all seen reports of struggling pitchers having a "great bullpen session" and continuing to struggle.

Maybe Rondon can be fixed in the time remaining. Maybe the Tigers will make a March trade — there's plenty of speculation about the availability of starter Rick Porcello. Perhaps they'll open the season counting on Leyland to work the closer-by-committee approach that worked so well for him in his Pittsburgh days more than 20 years ago.

Mark Teixeira didn't spend a lot of
time in a Team USA uniform this week.
He's been replaced on the roster by
Eric Hosmer of Kansas City.

New York Yankees: First baseman Mark Teixeira injured his wrist hitting off a tee shortly after joining Team USA in preparation for the World Baseball Classic, and he'll be out of action eight to 10 weeks, or into May — a rather similar return date to that of outfielder Curtis Granderson, who broke his forearm in his first exhibition at-bat.

Tex, Grandy, Alex Rodriguez — the Yankees have more than $60 million in salaries already destined for the disabled list on Opening Day, or roughly twice the Houston Astros' projected payroll. (Heck, even general manager Brian Cashman broke a leg and dislocated an ankle skydiving for a veterans charity.)

If you're going to lose lineup keys for eight weeks, it's just as well that a sizable chuck of that time be spring training. But that's a lot of power suddenly vanished from the Yankee lineup for at least a month.

This being the Yankees, there's a lot of speculation that  Cashman will acquire a veteran. Which brought on this tweet Wednesday from the Daily News' Mark Feinsand:

Cashman said NYY could look at a pool of 1B and 3B thanks to (Kevin) Youkliis' versatility: "It's kind of like a baby pool. A lot of kids pee in it."

Ah, lemme guess: He's not that thrilled with the options outside the Yankees system either.

The 2001 draft: Joe Mauer, Mark Prior, Mark Teixeira

Mark Teixeira let this grounder get through him in
Game 2 of the ALDS on Monday

Mark Teixeira looks ... old. He's 32, but the Yankees first baseman is playing older and stiffer than that.

In 2010, he hit .256/.365/.481; in 2011, he hit .248/.341/.494; this year, .251/.332/.475. Batting average unimpressive, walks dropping, still hitting an occasional bomb ... And the Yankees are committed to him for another four years at $22.5 million a year.

I've little doubt that the calf injury that cost him most of September still bothers him somewhat and helps make him look slow and unathletic in these playoffs, but that's still a three-year trend line that has to be worrisome to the Yankees.

Teixeira was the fifth player taken in the famous 2001 draft, although he was widely regarded as one of the top three talents. He slipped, without a doubt, because he was aligned with Scott Boras, and many a team preferred not to deal with that devil.

Joe Mauer, as we Twins fans know, went first and Mark Prior second. The only quarrels anybody had at the time was which order the two should be in. The Twins clearly made the right choice.

They were followed by  two high school pitchers: Dewon Brazelton (Tampa Bay) and Gavin Floyd (Philadelphia). Brazelton flopped, and the Phillies traded Floyd to the White Sox, where he's been a good-but-not-great starter for six seasons.

Then Texas popped Teixeira. He was the fifth guy taken in the draft, but he'll probably wind up making the most money of anybody in the field.

What intrigues me today, looking at the 2001 draft with more than a decade of hindsight, is how poorly the rest of the first round played out. The best of the rest were Casey Kotchman and Jeremy Bonderman. Noah Lowry and Bobby Crosby had their moments but flamed out early, and Mike Fontenot has hung around as a utilityman/low-grade regular, but you've got to go to the supplemental round and the 38th overall pick (David Wright) to find the next star in that draft.

Pic of the Week

Mark Teixeira reacts after Nick Swisher struck out with
the bases loaded on Thursday.

I said this on Facebook immediately after the Detroit Tigers won Game Five on Thursday:

Life is always better when the Yankees lose.

Words to live by.

The Mark Teixeira factor

The paperwork hasn't necessarily been turned in, but it's probably at least filled out: The Yankees are expected to remove Mark Teixeira, the Yankees first baseman/No. 3 hitter, from their roster before today's game.

The slugger sufficiently wrecked his hamstring Tuesday night to end his season.

Mark Teixeira led the American League in runs scored
this season (113) — and it was clearly his worst season
since his rookie year in 2003.

Teixeira is a significant figure in the construction of both the ALCS contenders — and, for that matter, in the roster composition of another playoff team, the Atlanta Braves.

The Texas Rangers landed Teixeira in the 2001 draft — the same draft the Twins opened by taking Joe Mauer — and quickly converted him from his collegiate position (third base) to first because they had, in Hank Blalock, a third baseman they expected would be an lineup fixture for years to come. Tex became the regular at first in 2003; he hit 26 homers that year, which remains his career low.

(The Texas infield that season: Teixeira at first, Michael Young at second, Blalock at third, Alex Rodriguez at short. They combined for 385 runs, 364 RBIs, 116 homers, and a .292 batting average. They went 71-91.)

in 2007, Texas traded him (and Ron Mahay)  to Atlanta for a passel of prospects. Included in that package were Neftali Feliz, now the Texas closer and a likely Rookie of the Year winner; and Elvis Andrus, the Texas shortstop and leadoff hitter, who (my opinion then and now) should have been the Rookie of the Year winner last season. The Braves made that trade hoping to sign the Georgia Tech alum to a long-term deal, but he has Scott Boras for an agent, and players hire Boras to go to free agency.

The Braves moved Tex to Anaheim in midseason of 2008, Teixeira's walk year. Their take — Casey Kotchman — was nowhere near the price they paid.

Then Teixeira signed an eight-year deal with the Yankees. According to Baseball Reference, he is to be paid $22.5 million in each of the next six seasons.

The Rangers have profited from the Teixeira pick at least as much by trading him as they did by playing him. The Twins have no cause to regret taking Mauer ahead of him, but the other three teams that picked ahead of the Rangers probably do.

Backwards bullpen thinking

Oh, those Yankee switch-hitters.

Darren Oliver's career got a
second wind when he shifted
to the bullpen in 2004.

Game one, ALDS: The game is tied at 4, and the Yankees have Derek Jeter, Nick Swisher and Mark Teixiera due up in the eighth inning — right, switch, switch — followed by Alex Rodriguez, another right-handed hitter. Ron Gardenhire wheels in right-handed Jesse Crain, who gets Jeter but then allows a single to Swisher, a home run to Teixeira and a single to A-Rod before being pulled. That's the game: 6-4, Yankees.

Game one, ALCS: The Rangers have a 5-1 lead in the eighth inning, but Brett Gardner leads off with an infield single and Derek Jeter's liner eludes Michael Young. With Swisher and Teixeira coming up, Ron Washington turns to veteran lefty Darren Oliver — who walks both the switch-hitters and departs. The Yankees score five runs in the eighth. That's the game: 6-5, Yankees.

OK, here's the puzzle: Facing the same two men, one manager turned to a right-handed reliever, the other to a lefty. Why?

My answer: Both Crain and Oliver have histories of being "backwards" — that is, they reverse the platoon advantage, or at least minimize it.

Crain in 2010, for example, held left-handed hitters to a slash stat line of .196/.281/.333, while righties were .228/.304/.331. Over his career, lefties have a slight platoon advantage, but not as much as usual.

Oliver's season stats were more LOOGY than backwards (.200/.234/.295 vs lefties, .281/.344/.421 vs. righties), but he's been backwards repeatedly in previous seasons, and his career splits are pretty even.

Backwards relievers are prized in Strat-O-Matic leagues for just such matchups. Theoretically, they deprive switch-hitters of their platoon edge.

But Swisher and Teixeira are dangerous from either side, and neither Crain nor Oliver made good pitches.

Gardenhire's move was even more defensible because both Swisher and Teixeira are better hitters from the right side of the plate (against lefties) than from the left side. The percentages were with Crain; on that night, his slider wasn't.